One of the rare ones you probably *could* make up.
We were, to put it simply, on the run.
There was me, my mum, my dad, my nan, a tall girl with long black hair and a beautiful gold dress whose confidant I was, and a few odd retainers and things. We weren't actually *running*, we were just, y'know, on the run.
Moving at night and hiding during the day, through the forest that belonged to the people we were on the run from. It was the fourth or fifth day of this and suddenly we heard hoofbeats. Startled, we grabbed everything we could and began to edge our way as quietly as possible in the other direction. We didn't think we would get away, though, and we were right. We emerged from the forest onto a grassy bank to find that the horses we'd heard had kept pace with us all the way, and were waiting for us. But seated on the foremost horse was not, in fact, the Duc de whatever (the one we were running from) but his brother, with whom (as all the world knew) he was engaged in a conflict of bitter enmity and all that sort of thing.
So we were safe. For now. He smiled at us - not a tall man, on horseback he always felt superior, and with his long black hair and silver coronet he cut quite a striking figure. He invited us to join him for church, and, wary of raising suspicion (for we thought he didn't know the reasons for our flight and if he did know, might be legally obliged to hand us over to his brother) we accepted. Several of his guards (although their official title was 'Firemen' - I'm not sure why) dismounted and helped us down the bank. One in particular caught my eye, and I smiled at him and made extra effort to appear helpless...
We walked on, I beside my girl-friend, with two of the Firemen accompanying us. The Duc de whatever's brother was up ahead and I suddenly realised he had his cousin with him; his cousin to whom my girl-friend had once been betrothed. She regarded him with contempt and I elbowed her in the side and told her to at least *look* interested.
We reached the church, a beautiful grey stone thing, soon after, and the Duc's brother led my mother and father and grandmother in through the front door, followed by my girl-friend (I wish she'd had a name, but I don't think she did.) The rest of us, as servants of a kind, had to climb in through the windows into the upper galleries. By the time I got there, the Fireman who'd caught my attention was already seated with a space beside him, so I levered myself through the window and, briefly, onto his lap. He grinned at me, said "Is this entirely proper?" I laughed, and would have replied but the service was about to start and I had to slide onto the seat and keep silence.
My mother noticed something was wrong almost immediately, signalling rapidly to my father and my grandmother, but it was only when the Duc's brother took my girl-friend by the hand and pulled her up to the altar that I realised what was going on. We'd been trapped, and she would be forced to wed the Duc's brother's cousin, and mother was signalling to us all to get out. So I did. Scrambled back out of the window - strangely, nobody made a move to catch any of us - and ran for it.
For a while I just ran, in towards the town, knowing that in the town there would be somewhere where I could meet up with the rest of us. Sure enough, quite soon my mother came into view, struggling through the mud in her high satin shoes. I helped her onto the road and we discussed what to do. "There must be somewhere in town we could hide," she said, "Your nan's picked up a gypsy man who claims he can pick any lock. Take your father and find somewhere for us." In the end we all went looking; by now it was raining and we must have looked a strange sight, but nobody gave us a second look. We still had to hide, though. Up some city stairs and round a corner, we found some stairs down into what seemed to be a basement undertaker's. Sure enough, nanna's gypsy picked the lock and we headed down, warily, expecting something awful one way or another.
Nothing awful greeted us, though. There were two rooms - one a gentleman's study full of leatherbound books (into which my father quickly disappeared) and one clearly intended to display coffins, but there were none in evidence, just a rather smart glass and wood table, several music stands and a dresser with plates of iced buns on it.
So the gypsy and I ate some of the iced buns, and then I got woken up.